


The Story of Lloyd: The Homicidal Cat from Across the Hall

by mcgarrygirl78



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: F/M, Friendship, Humor, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-01
Updated: 2015-10-01
Packaged: 2018-04-24 06:35:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4909060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcgarrygirl78/pseuds/mcgarrygirl78
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I feel like Cousin Clara from Heidi.” He mumbled, looking at them with disdain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Story of Lloyd: The Homicidal Cat from Across the Hall

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for the prompt crutches, sent to me by anonymous.

“Oh my God, what happened to you?”

Olivia jumped out of her chair as he came hobbling into her office. The crutches seemed too tall, he was having trouble deciding if he needed to walk or hobble. Rafael held up one hand, stumbling a bit while attempting to keep her at bay.

“I can do it, Sergeant. I need to get used to these eventually.”

He pushed the door closed with one of the crutches before making his way over to a chair. It took forever, Rafael was exhausted by the time he got there. Letting go of the breath he didn’t even realize that he was holding, he fell down into the chair. The wooden crutches hit the floor with an unceremonious thud. Olivia leaned on her desk, crossed her feet and just looked at him.

“Don’t look at me like that.” He said.

“I haven’t seen you in three days and you come hobbling into my office in crutches and a boot. I'm gonna look at you like that.”

“I feel ridiculous. I don’t even know how to work those things.”

“Haven’t you ever had a broken limb before?” she asked.

“My jaw…long story.”

“Yeah,” Olivia leaned to pick up the crutches. “You wouldn’t need crutches for that. They’re adjustable. These little metal things here can unscrew some and you can adjust them for height.”

“I feel like Cousin Clara from Heidi.” He mumbled, looking at them with disdain.

“I think she was bedridden. You might mean Pollyanna.”

“She had the braces like FDR.” Rafael shook his head. “It doesn’t matter anyway. I’ll be walking with those for the next month. I'm supposed to keep as much pressure off as possible, which I have yet to do.”

“You also haven’t told me what happened yet.”

Olivia put the crutches under her arms. She was testing them and didn’t want to ask Rafael to stand up again. Just a hair taller than him, it would be a more accurate assessment than he'd done thus far.

“My neighbor has a cat.”

“You have a neighbor…I've never seen them before.”

“You may know the name. Its Alicia ‘Woo-Woo’ Childs.”

“Woo-Woo Childs lives across the hall from you?” Olivia’s eyes widened. “She’s Street Beatz’ fiancée. He must be the biggest producer in East Coast hip-hop right now.”

“Yes, and thankfully she lives pretty quietly. She has two cats, which I only know because I'm allergic to them. Hairy bastards.”

“What does your neighbor having cats have to do with a boot and crutches?”

“One of them, his name is Lloyd, is an escape artist. He gets out of the condo all the time and wanders the hall. It drives me nuts because when he's out there my sneezing gets worse. On Sunday I worked late at the office. 

“When I got home one of the lights was out right off the elevator. The fluffy cretin was lying in the middle of the floor but I never saw him. I tripped, flew, landed on the carpet pretty hard. The doctor says my ankle isn't broken but it’s a significant sprain.”

“Oh Rafael, I'm so sorry.”

“Alicia was as well. I have her solemn promise that she’ll keep the critter on a leash while he's in the house. People come and go from her place when she's around so the door opens and closes a lot. And when she's out of town the cat sitter comes.”

“Sounds like you and Woo-Woo have gotten chummy.”

“Please don’t call her that.” He rolled his eyes. “She's in her early 30s…we shouldn’t be forced to carry the nicknames from our teen years past voting age.”

He had been Lard Ass in high school, like the story in _Stand by Me_. Only the really mean kids called him that; he wasn’t even that fat. They were also the idiots since Lard Ass is obviously the hero of the story. Not that that made Rafael want to wear the name with pride or anything. 

His other nickname, Mouth Almighty wasn’t a favorite either. He couldn’t imagine someone hollering that all the way down the street now. He'd want to be swallowed by a manhole. Woo-Woo didn’t seem to mind that people knew who she was and how she got the name. Rafael thought it was disrespectful to call her that…he wasn’t a part of her life when that was who she was.

“That nickname made her a fair deal of money. She helped usher in the era of hip-hop video starlets.”

“She also has a homicidal cat, which is more pertinent at the moment. Did I mention that the beast came over to me while I was on the ground, walked over my back, and licked my face?”

Olivia started to laugh. She covered her mouth to keep the full guffaw down but she couldn’t help herself. Having no idea what Lloyd looked like, she just imagined a fluffy gray cat walking over Rafael as he lay injured in his own hallway. It wasn’t actually funny but it was so funny.

“I'm sorry.” She reached out and touched his shoulder. “I don’t mean to laugh. I'm sure Lloyd is evil.”

“You would be correct in that assessment.” He nodded. 

“So I guess you're going to be off your feet for a while?”

“Not hardly. I have two appearances in court this week. There’ll be a third if Capshaw doesn’t take the plea that my boss is forcing me to offer him.”

“I hate that he's going to get misdemeanor time for obvious felonies.” Olivia said. “I know sometimes we have to grin and bear it with the justice system but I know a predator when I see one. I don’t care that he's rolling on those bigger than him. It’s only a matter of time before he replaces one of them. The cycle never ends with guys like that.”

“His lawyer is trying to get probation and community service.”

“No way!” she exclaimed.

“Any kind of time and his name automatically goes on the registry. They're trying to avoid that at all costs.”

“He needs to be there. The people in this city need to be protected from him.”

“That’s what I said.” Rafael told her. “I want to take it to trial; my boss says hash it out.”

“You're still going to need to rest that ankle. A boot helps but the more you're on it the longer it will take to heal. Also, if the sprain is bad enough it can go from a sprain to a fracture without proper care.”

“I'm really busy right now, Liv.”

“I can help. Don’t things always work out better when we handle them as a team?”

“They do.” he smiled.

“So you do your day job, doing your best to sit as much as possible. And at night…”

“Keep talking.”

“I'm more of a show than a tell kinda girl, Counselor.”

“I haven’t touched you in three days.” He said it like a man who hadn’t had anything to eat or drink.

“How do you think that makes me feel?” she asked.

“I feel like we should be making it up to each other right now.” He held out his hand.

“Rafi…”

“The place is practically deserted and my ankle is pretty sore. A kiss from you is sure to make me feel better.”

Olivia made a noise of frustration but went and sat on his lap. The door was closed and so was the curtains; usually she was left alone at times like that. Rafael purred when she ran her fingers through his hair. Her lips teased his, almost kissing him so many times he thought he was going to lose it. He gently placed his hands on either side of her face to stop her moving. Then he kissed her. 

He kissed the hell out of her. Olivia wrapped her arm tighter around his neck, moaning as his tongue slid into her mouth. He was such a good kisser…she would be completely satisfied with doing nothing but seducing his lips for hours on end. Whenever they got into an intense kissing session their hands would find all kinds of other delightful places to go. Though mostly lost in each other, the couple managed to remember that they were nowhere near someplace private. That became abundantly clear when the door opened.

“Liv, I…oh shit, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“You're good Fin.” Clearing her throat, the Sergeant got up from the ADA’s lap. 

She learned a long time ago that there was no point in being bashful or upset or shady about it. Relationships could develop at the office, Liv was definitely not the first. You tried to maintain some decorum but sometimes a kiss in the evening from her lover was a more powerful draw than someone actually catching the moment.

“I'm just on my way out.” He said. “I'm in an hour early tomorrow. Ken’s having a party for this graphic novel stuff he's been working on and I promised I would be there so…”

“Oh no, go; I'm glad you two are doing OK again.”

“It’s a father and son thing, ebbs and flows. But his artwork is really good so I want to support him.”

“Well give him my love OK?”

“I will. You should get out of here too before that phone rings and keeps you here for another couple of hours.”

“That’s an excellent idea.” Olivia said. “Thanks Fin.”

“No problem. Goodnight, Liv. Goodnight, Barba.”

“Goodnight Fin.” Rafael held up his hand to wave. Once the door was closed he planned to apologize profusely to Olivia for putting her in such a compromising position at the job. She was their leader now and that required a certain amount of respect from her team.

“Oh, one more thing Liv.” Fin stuck his head into the door of her office.

“What's up?” she was already going back to her side of the desk.

“The spread was low so I’m not sure everyone is going to end up getting the money they put in. We should have a free lunch day to pacify them. They might end up with what they bet and maybe 50% of the spread but doubtful more than that. You know what I mean?”

“I know. We’ll do something next week for the whole squad. I hope only trusted colleagues were in on this.”

“Of course, you know I got ya back. See ya.”

“Goodnight.”

“What was that about?” Rafael turned to look at the door as Fin was leaving.

“Me and you.” She replied.

“How so?”

“The squad placed bets on us and Fin now has the proof so the game is over and people get their money. But the spread is thin, meaning people bet on the low stakes and the higher stakes but not so much in the middle and there may not be enough to give the high rollers what they would normally win for coming out right. To combat that we do a big lunch day for the squad so no one feels cheated.”

“So this is something that has happened before?” Rafael asked.

“I've been here 16 years, its happened. We have to do something to distract us from what we deal with every day. We have a breakup pool too. I won $45 the last time that was running.”

“You are a strange group of people.”

“Well you're our lawyer so what does that make you?”

“Yeah, I'm not going to answer that.”

“OK.” Liv smiled. “Do you want to grab some dinner?”

“I would much rather eat in tonight. My ankle is throbbing. I want to lie on the couch, watch C-Span or some sport I'm not completely paying attention to, and just pass out.”

“Wanna go it alone, Counselor?”

“Absolutely not. I can't state that enough.”

“Well I only have the loveseat at my place so...”

“We can max out in the bedroom.” Rafael said. “That way I won't have to go so far to seduce you.”

“You know,” Liv was opening and closing desk drawers, getting all the things she needed to leave for the night. “Seduce kind of rhymes with boot.”

“You're such a comedian.”

He grimaced as he got out of the chair. Picking up the crutches again, whatever Olivia had done to them they were more comfortable. Not actually comfortable, just more so than before. A month on these things were going to be the death of him. If he was pitiful enough there would probably be lots of cuddles and kisses to make him feel better. Rafael wouldn’t be at all opposed to that.

“Are you going to need help walking to the elevator?” Liv asked. She put her bag over her shoulder and took her coat from the rack in the corner.

“No, I did OK on my own and that was before you adjusted these torture devices for me.”

“You're really going to have to keep an eye out for random hallway cats.” She said as she put her hand on his shoulder and they walked out of the office. “I heard they're rampant this time of year.”

***


End file.
